


Star Wars: FireBrand

by MSKavanagh



Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015), Star Wars Original Trilogy
Genre: First Order, Gen, Hoth, Multi, Original Character(s), Other, Science Fiction, Sith, Sith Empire, Star Wars References, Transgender
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-01-22
Updated: 2017-04-25
Packaged: 2018-05-15 14:45:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,227
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5789362
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MSKavanagh/pseuds/MSKavanagh
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>An Imperial Agent named Beatrice Garrett, under the First Order, has been sent to survey the ice planet Hoth for rebellion activity. Everything seems pretty quiet until she meets a peculiar droid named BB-3, and learns of a crashed and assumed pirate vessel just a few clicks east of her camp...</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. A Cold Day In Hell

**Author's Note:**

> Beatrice character profile:
> 
> As we enter the story, Beatrice is an Imperial agent working for the Galactic Empire in a cold war against the scattered Rebels, but her story most certainly does not start there.
> 
> Beatrice was born aboard an Imperial Navy ship to a military family that was always on the move. She grew up learning through watching strategic command and combat practice, rather than playing games and making friends.
> 
> When she was born she was first designated male, but utilizing technology and medicine granted through her parents, she was easily able to fix what might have been an issue that held her back later in life.
> 
> Following in the footsteps of her parents, who were killed in action well into her late teens, she enlisted with the Imperial Army under the First Order and mastered the ways of subterfuge, rising as she could through ranks and rolling through each and every one of her assignments with relative ease.
> 
> She gained the respect of many of her superiors, including off-the-cuff mention from Captain Phasma, through much daunting hard work and determination. All of this, of course, eventually culminates to her assigned mission on Hoth, where there is thought to be small bursts of Rebellion activity. Nobody knows for sure if this is true, but that doesn’t change her mission…

 

Living life through the scope of a blaster rifle isn’t really all it’s cracked up to be, especially when you’re lying stomach first in a pile of frigid slush and the wind is whipping at your exposed cheekbones. And although this isn’t the ideal job, it’s what I signed up for and it’s what I was born to do.

My passion for the Galactic Empire can be measured in the amount of shots I’ve taken, scratched off marks on the side of the weapon, all successful hits. Some of them influential, some fodder to rile up the Rebels, keep them guessing, you know?

Gloved hand wrapped around the grip, I squeeze the trigger and a single bolt of red travels precisely forty two yards away. Accounting for the wind and measure of distance, the Tauntaun goes down with relative ease and now I’ve got dinner.

Three days out here so far and I’ve seen nothing but endless piles of snow, ice, and these particular creatures. But I’m not about to give up. I mean, it’s not like I’m allowed to, anyway.

Missions like these it’s a procurement on sight sort of deal, at least in terms of nourishment and shelter. No problem for me, though, I’ve been doing this so long I don’t really know any other way to live.

I push myself up and make calculated movements across the landscape, finally coming down with my knife when I reach my bounty, my sustenance.

“Thanks.” I say, as the blade rips through its flesh. I pull off slabs of thick meat and fat and shove them into the pack slung over my shoulder. Not my favorite food, but it’ll do.

With a hand to my brow, I look up into the sky and as usual, another blizzard is heading in, something that would snuff out any other soldier in my field. Of course, that’s because they aren’t Beatrice Garrett.

As the wind kicks up even more unforgiving than my direct commanding officer in the face of rookie mistakes, I can see behind me the pellets of white coming down from the sky in blankets. They fall with a furious raging, biting chill the hits my face like an uppercut.

In a short fifteen minute trek I could be back at camp eating burnt Tauntaun and reading a holocron on Sith training and protocol, but here I am drudging through the white because I totally could not have gone hunting earlier in the day.

Of course not.

If anything in the universe is going to kill me it won’t be a Jedi, it won’t be a Wampa—It’ll be my never-ending procrastination. After all of my training, everything I grew into, putting important things off is still one of my specialties.

I come up on a hill and in the blurry distance I can see the little hole of a cave I’d dug out for myself, but wait… Something’s down there, something’s moving.

Dropping back to my stomach in a robotic kind of way, I pull my rifle over my shoulder and bring the scope up to my fluttering eyelids that work against me in the blizzard’s onslaught.

At first it’s hard to make out, it’s nothing more than a shape. But when the white clears for a moment I can then see that this is in fact a living being of sorts. Well, a droid to be precise.

I could argue for hours as to whether or not droids are sentient enough to even be considered living beings.

For the moment though, my only question is where did it come from and who’s it working for?

Small enough to be about two times the size of a flight helmet and splotched with white and green. No other identifying marks and symbols.

I could either call back to command and ask for their opinion on the matter, or I could take my chances because when has anyone been seriously threatened by a droid?

I choose the latter.

My feet clomp down the hill, eyes focused on the setting sun and my camp ahead where the peculiar little droid awaits. I can only imagine its reason for sitting outside of a stranger’s camp, considering how dangerous the galaxy can be. Although, maybe its got a good reason.

As I make my way across the plain I check each direction using the macrobinoculars from my pack to be sure I’m not being followed, that it’s just me out here, once again affirming that this survey mission is likely a total bust.

If there ever was Rebel activity here I really don’t think there is anymore.

They may be fighting against everything I know and was taught, but they definitely do not make very many slip-ups in regards to their tactics.

And as I approach the entrance to my makeshift snow-cave, eyes fixed to the droid, I wonder if this _really_ is a survey mission, if there is an ulterior motive to all of this.

Brow scrunched as I tower over it, “What are you doing here?”

The droid rolls back, leans itself up toward me and beeps in an excited manner.

Walking inside, I drop my bag on the ground and turn back around, “Alright BB-3, but I need to know why you’re here, where did you come from?”

Rolling inside, it taps against the wall of my temporary home and gives a sorrowful bout of whirs.

Eyes narrowed, I push the metal covering over the entrance and strike up a fire at my knees, looking back to BB-3, “I’m sorry your master was killed in a crash.” But I’d be lying if I said there was any real sympathy in those words. “Who did they work for? Who were they fighting for?”

It pauses for a few seconds while I toss the chilled meat into the flames and offers a set of monotone beeps.

“Unaffiliated? So in other words they were a pirate?” Jamming my knife into the earth beneath me. “Well then I have good news and bad news.”

The droid’s tone changes to an inquisitive kind of beeping.

“The good news is, I’m not going to dismantle you and return you to the fleet for information gathering.” Removing the thickly lined coat from my shoulders, “But you can’t stay here.’

BB-3 beeps another saddening string of gradually lower decibel sounds.

“I apologize,” Picking up my knife and using it to turn the slab of flesh over, “But I’m on a job here, a mission. I can’t have anything getting in the way of that.”

I bundle up my coat behind me and use it as a pillow-rest, snapping the stomach pack off and laying it aside. Then I notice my white and gray shirt totally drenched in freezing sweat and dried blood in the center of my chest.

The droid rolls over to my side and nudges my arm, extending its mechanical micro-arm from its chest obviously pointing out the spot where it looks as though I likely stabbed myself.

Not the actions of a trained agent.

“No, no. This is from hunting.” Picking up a dirty old rag from the ground, I attempt to wipe away the splotch. “It must’ve leaked through my jacket.”

BB-3 stirs in-question.

“A Tauntaun, what I’m cooking here on the fire.” I rest my weapon against the wall, wondering if BB here might notice the markings across its side and I pick up one of my less dirty plates. “I’d offer you a slice but I know droids don’t eat meat.”

The slab of food slaps onto the ceramic and I grab my utility food utensil out of my pocket. Hungry, real hungry, but also not too excited about the animal’s carcass I’m about to shove in my mouth.

I’d much rather have, what’s it called? A sauced pie of dough with cheese.

Right before I lift a chopped up piece of the animal to my mouth, BB-3 nudges me again and bleep bloops as if its looking into my eyes.

“I don’t know.” Waving the food around. “Sure I guess, stay. For the night at least, then maybe you can show me your master’s ship?”

The droid gives me a loud, excited screech.

I give it a bit of a feigned smile and wrap my lips around the meat.

Just as I remember, the animal feels spongy against my tongue and stringy between my teeth. Not an appetizing texture at all, unless, you know I was eating noodles or something of the like.

BB-3 scoots itself over to the corner of our little shared space and its lights dim out, likely shutting down for the evening.

Thankfully.

There’s only so much I can bear talking to something that uses a string of beeps and whirs to communicate its thoughts and apparent feelings.

After taking a few more bites I feel a bit too nauseated to continue, so I sit the plate down beside myself and the holocron I’ve been meaning to look further into.

Sith training is one of my favorite topics. Even with everything I’ve done, I’ve never even had the chance to see the old Sith graveyard planet Korriban, where the academy rose and fell countless times over the centuries.

In my reading, it all seems mythical, and a part of me wishes she could wield the force in the ways the Sith do. To me, there is a large difference between using a rifle to strike down one’s foes, and using only the power of your mind, and the energy that flows through you.

Nevertheless, even if I was force sensitive I don’t even know if I’d have the charisma and ambition to survive the training.

At least not anymore than I have now.

The wind and the snow outside beats against my shelter and the fire before me flickers in the draft that seeps through the cracks, sending shivers that crawl up my spine like spiders.

Pulling a fur throw over myself and tucking the long strands of my hair behind my ears, I lay over on my side and stare blankly into the dancing red and yellow before I become too drowsy to stay awake any further.

Another day, another whole handful of nothing.

 


	2. Making Headway

“Flank right!” He shouts into my comm system, “We have this one in the bag!”

Hands on the flight controls, I jerk them to the side and the vessel does a roll spiraling around until the enemy ship is locked on-target.

Grin peeled across my face, “Firing.”

Blue and green pulses of beams burst through the blackness and in a single shot of a second an eruption of orange fills our surroundings.

“Target eliminated.” Fist clenched, I give my wing-man a congratulatory nod.

But that wasn’t the only X-Wing and it’s too late to make the call, or any significant evasive maneuver. While being targeted, systems shrieking in their klaxons, I panic for a few seconds before a voice whispers in my ear, and I immediately let go of the flight controls and squeeze my eyelids together.

My commanding officer, Sasha, shouts into the comm, “Beatrice! What are you doing?! Take control of your fighter, now!”

I can feel it emanating through me in a vibration that pulses into the surrounding spaces around me. I can see the ship before me without using my eyes and I can feel its movements.

Everything makes it motions with energy that touches my mind, like little pulses telling me where to go and what to do.

My enemy takes their position directly behind me as the Star Destroyer vanishes over the horizon of Korriban, all things I experience without using any of my natural senses.

Alarms seemingly growing louder and louder, there’s a sudden chattering break of inquisitive beeping and then my eyes shoot open again.

“BB-3.” I groan with a hand to one of my eyes blocking out the sun that spills through the half-open entrance, yawning, “Good morning.”

They beep at me with some mixture of tones it’s too early for me to identify.

Pushing further out from beneath my blanket, my eyes still partly glued together in sleep, I stand and stretch, removing my shirt from the day before and pulling a clean one from the wall.

BB-3 makes an eep and their whir trails off behind me.

Let’s see.

Water.

Old cheese.

Bread.

I take a fist of bread and cheese after I slip a clean shirt over myself and the mixture of dairy and wheat is something you choke down, because it certainly doesn’t get any better than this. That’s what I tell myself.

Washing that down with water I yearn for even just a drop of coffee, and then I remember my conversation with BB-3 the night before.

I wonder if that crashed space vessel has coffee.

Bending over for my jacket, still yawning and rubbing my eyes, I shout for the half-cocked exit, “BB! Droid! We’re going to that ship, where’d you go?”

One arm through a sleeve, canteen of water in my hand and then I watch them slide back through the crevice hailing me in a singing tone.

“You’re sure you can find it with all that snow and wind?” Zipping up my jacket, slinging my rifle around my chest. “Because I am totally not up for getting lost today.”

They respond with a confident set of three beeps.

“Alright, just give me like, five minutes and we’ll go.” I swish a hair tie out of my pocket and wrap it around my flowing tail of hair.

I’m actually a little excited. This entire excursion has been nothing but boredom thus far and a crashed ship, rebellion or not, is better than nothing.

What I do hope for are friendlier weather conditions than I’ve been met with the past six days, because really, I’m starting to lose feeling in my toes and I’ve just about had enough with surgeries for one lifetime.

In an electronic hum, BB-3 pushes back through the door and out into the day that awaits, but before I can follow my comm unit rings.

I wait until it goes off three times before I answer it.

“ _Agent Garrett, I trust your mission has been at least somewhat fruitful_?” Sasha asks while completely avoiding niceties.

Holding the hologram of my commanding officer out in front of me, “It’s nice to hear from you too, ma’am.” I greet her with a snide tone in my voice, “Unfortunately, no. The Rebellion does not seem to be operating in this sector, at all. The place is dead like Kylo Ren’s shriveled heart.”

She doesn’t even giggle a little bit, “Watch your tone. That’s fine, it’s what we expected. I want you to spend one more day out there and then prepare for pickup, we have another assignment waiting for you.”

“Already?” I move the cover away from the entrance as I speak. “Well l can’t say no to more money. How about that request I made a few months back? Any word on it?”

“ _You also can’t disobey direct orders. Remember that. And as for the starship you’ve requested, no. There has been no word on whether you’ll be receiving your own. Not like you need one as you aren’t currently authorized for free-travel_.”

She seems to pace a bit as if becoming impatient with me, typical. Our commanders and captains aren’t much for pointless banter.

“I understand that, but owning a starship of your own, it’s like a status symbol, you know?” I appeal to her narcissism in an attempt to draw out some empathy.

She doesn’t answer me immediately, but when she does, she gives me a different kind of response than I was expecting. _“Sure, yeah. If you say so. Tell you what. You amass the credits for a starship, you’re free to purchase one to do… whatever it is you plan on doing. Docking with the fleet and feeling good about yourself, or what-have-you_.”

“Right, totally on top of that…” My eyes move to the side, feeling the sting of being shot down.

“ _Just finish up your mission there and be ready. I will see you in a little over 24 hours_.” And then she promptly disconnects the transmission.

Don’t get me wrong, working with and for the Empire has been the best thing for me. But I want a ship! Half of the other agents in my assigned unit have their own, so why not me?

Maybe they don’t appreciate me.

Maybe the work I do isn’t good enough.

Maybe I need to show them otherwise.

A burning churns in the pit of my stomach, the thought of being unappreciated after all I’ve done… It inspires something I haven’t felt in a long time.

Rage.

For so long I had managed to master the acquired skill of controlling one’s emotions as if I was some kind of Jedi, except without the power to move, or destroy things with only my mind.

But, to be honest, it was foolish of me to think that suppressing emotion was even remotely healthy.

In this moment all I want to do is shoot something, to break something. BB-3 is out-of-the-question, as I need them to locate this supposed crashed ship.

I need a release!

Throwing my gun down in a fit, the heat boiling in my head, I grab my plate from the night before and I slam it against the wall.

“You don’t appreciate me?!” Hands sprawled out against the hardened snow and mud concoction that makes up my shelter, I stomp and dig my foot into the ground, my whole body trembling. “After EVERYTHING I’ve done!”

The area around me, everything, it all starts to shake as if an earthquake is moving through the area.

Huffing, puffing, I take a second and bring my composure back and find myself in confusion.

Some of my things fell over, my fire-pit spilled out onto my resting area. Ashes flutter though the air and out of the corner of my eye I can see the droid peeping in at me, likely wondering what it is I’m even doing.

I squeeze my eyes closed and concentrate as hard as I can.

Calm down.

Hoth.

Hoth doesn’t usually get earthquakes…

Shaking my head and retrieving my gun from the ground, I dismiss the apparently natural phenomena and give BB-3 a nod, “So, ready to go then?”

For a moment, they don’t beep, or respond for that matter, at all. And even after that all I get is a single confirmation before BB-3 moves back into the open.

Guess I scared the little ball-bot.

I couldn’t expect a droid to understand anger, right? To understand being under-appreciated.

No.

They wouldn’t know anything about that.

As I step out into the beating sun, the biting cold and the pleasantly low wind chill, I crack my neck and stretch out my arms. “Alright!” Giving the droid a glance. “Which direction are we headed?”

They look back at me, whirring cautiously and then they start heading east.

East, don’t think I’ve been in that direction more than once or twice. This explains why I probably totally missed it, at least depending on how large it is, or how buried it might be.

“East it is!” I shout forward jogging to catch up, “Was there anyone else on the ship besides your master?”

BB honks at me in what I swear is an irritated tone after an aggravating ten second grace period.

Wagging my finger,“Now you listen here, don’t give me that attitude. I am not your enemy. If I was I would have dissembled you on-sight.”

They then squeal as if I’m actually threatening to do so.

I sigh and flop my arms against my legs, “Let’s just keep moving.”

The droid dings once in agreement and speeds up ahead of me.

As we make our way to the supposed crash site I examine the snow for tracks besides our own because with one crashed ship, there are likely more. Maybe. And if there are more ships then I am definitely not alone out here.

Being ambushed by trade pirates is the last thing I need during my last day on this frozen, boring rock.

Or worse yet, Jedi.

I’ve only had exactly one run-in with a Jedi and at the time he didn’t know that I was Empire, or First Order affiliated, which was super lucky for me. It was a cantina on Tatooine. I’d just finished a clean-up job and I was stopping in for a drink.

There were all sorts there. Slavers, nobodies, outcasts, wannabes, pirates and then there was Araron Witt, a tall sort of guy with a robe draped over himself and a hood that hid his bleached blond hair.

But I could feel it in his presence that he was heavily influenced by the force, and I stayed the hell out of his way.

That was back when I was about twenty two years old and I’d only been an agent of the Empire for a few measly years. My training was still on-going and I was as green as they get.

Thinking about that cantina and my current predicament sort of makes me pine for a stiff Coruscant brandy. Thinking about drinking anything at all besides water also reminds me of my plight for coffee.

“BB-3! Tell me there was coffee on your master’s ship, at least?” Tightening the strap around my chest, trying to keep up as my feet grow more and more damp by the minute.

And then they stop real abrupt before swiveling around to face me.

“Yes?” I look down, confused. “Why did you stop? Does your ship have coffee on it?”

BB-3 bleeps a multitude of different tones at me in a long-winded effort to explain to me that we’re standing right on top of where the ship had crashed and that they’re quite saddened at the thought of having to dig for it.

Great.

“So it’s buried?” Slapping a hand to my forehead. “You know I didn’t bring a shovel. Or explosives for that matter.”

That’s when they pop open their compartment on the back and something peculiar falls out.

“Oh, is that what I think it is?” Eyeing the object, I swear it looks exactly like a lightsaber.

Their continued beeping confirms that what I’m looking at in fact is a lightsaber, and that BB-3 intends for me to use it to cut a hole through the mound of snow blocking the entrance to the ship. The ship, of which, I still can’t make out through all of the endless white in front of me.

The droid moves aside and tells me that if I cut a hole right where they were standing previously, it’ll open up a gap just large enough to force the door open.

I’ve never even held a lightsaber before.

Up until this point a blaster rifle has been my only means of protection. My only means of…well, murder, to put it simply.

It feels light in my hands, cold, but somehow it also feels right? I assure that the dangerous end is pointing away from me and I press the activation button, a magenta beam shooting out in a swish, just as long as my own arm.

“Wow.” I hold it, attention completely fixed on this thing, I wave it around mocking a close-quarters battle. “This is pretty neat.”

BB-3 insists that I stop playing around and cut the hole because the weather isn’t getting any better and contrary to what I might believe, they can rust, at the very least.

“Alright, alright.” I swing it around a few more times before jamming it directly into the mushy mess.

Realizing I’m not totally sure where the snow ends and the ship starts, I angle the beam and move it around in a rather large, person-sized circle. As the snow gradually melts away I bite my lip in hopes that I didn’t shear through the hull, or accidentally weld the airlock shut.

There. That should do just fine.

“You mind if I keep this?” Shutting the power off, I hold it in my palm and wiggle it at the droid. “It’s pretty nice.”

Beeping in contemplation, probably considering my behavior they witnessed only a little while ago, they give me a reluctant affirmative.

“Thank you.” Stuffing it into my belt strap. “I absolutely promise not to dismantle you.” I give the droid a wink.

When the snow finally clears I get a glimpse of the ship that it hides, a shiny type of black with silver trim. The airlock is rectangular and operates with an electronic panel.

BB-3 pushes by my leg and extends its little arm to go to work on the locking mechanism.

Watching as the droid works, I ask, “So what did your master call this vessel? Does it have a name?”

They ignore me as they finish off on the lock and in a lot of clicking and clacking, the door begins to open. When it’s finished, all I can see is a dimly lit corridor with yet another door at the other end, a floor so clean you could likely eat off of it.

Rolling in before me, BB turns around in an inviting manner and announces to me the name of the ship.

The FireBrand. 


End file.
